


Time to Make a Change

by FunnyWings



Series: Wayward AF [5]
Category: Supernatural, Wayward Sisters (TV)
Genre: A wild archangel appears offscreen, Angst, Canon Compliant, Case Fic, Episode: s14e01 Stranger in a Strange Land, F/F, F/M, Fairies, Family Drama, Gen, Monster of the Week, Wayward Sisters, canon compliant so far, spoilers for season 14
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-14
Updated: 2018-10-14
Packaged: 2019-08-02 05:04:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,682
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16298657
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FunnyWings/pseuds/FunnyWings
Summary: With Wendy and Donna missing in another dimension, it's up to Claire to put aside her revenge quest and work with a familiar face. Part of the Wayward AF series.Excerpt:She saw Kaia lying next to Claire on a blanket in a field, and then a fierce battle between the two. The images flickered back and forth rapidly, and randomly. By trying to reach deeper into the image, Patience felt herself growing dizzy with the dissonance. She nearly threw up before she figured out how to release her hold on Kaia’s projected thoughts. Her inner turmoil.“How did you do that?” Patience demanded, a little weak in her knees now. Kaia just blinked. “Who are you? Kaia couldn’t do that.”“I’m Kaia,” said Kaia. Patience’s disbelief was palpable. Kaia hesitated, and then jutted her chin out in preemptory defiance. “And I’m from the Bad Place.”It was definitely time that Patience called Jody.





	Time to Make a Change

Just because Patience had decided to accept the fact she was a psychic does not mean she had gotten used to it. Or that she understood exactly how it works, or how to channel it. She knew it could be channeled and controlled because Missouri was able to control (for the most part) her abilities, but every attempt Patience made at control was undermined. Visions stayed frustratingly out of reach when she reached for them, and came at the most inconvenient of times.

Her most recent vision came as Jody and Claire were loading up for a rescue mission of sorts. After six missed calls on Donna’s phone call and a sleepless night of worry for Jody, she’d decided they were looking into what exactly Donna and Wendy’s hunting mission had led them to. Alex had told them to call her with updates and then went to her shift at the hospital, aiming a worried look back at Patience.

Just as the door closed behind Alex, Patience had frozen, her sight blurring and reforming. But what she saw was impossible. In front of her was Kaia, wide eyed but determined. She raised a knife to her palm and slit it open, spoke a word, and then stepped back about five feet. Where she had been standing a sickly ghost of a golden tear between worlds appeared. She looked directly at Patience then, and the way she smiled made Patience’s blood go cold. It was the way a snake might smile at a mouse, and despite the fact she had about a foot on Kaia, Patience felt every bit the mouse.

“Hey,” Claire said, waving her arm in front of Patience’s face. Patience pushed her away in irritation, and Claire smirked at her. Because annoying Patience Turner was a fucking sport, even if they had overcome some of their initial animosity. “Think up anything useful for us, Cassandra?”

Patience froze for a second, and glanced at Jody before looking back at Claire. She swallowed hard, knowing Claire would be able to tell she was lying.

“No.”

“Oh come on,” said Claire. “What did you see? Wendy and Donna’s lives might be on the line, don’t hold out on us now.”

“I’m not,” said Patience. “I just… I left something back at the church… I’ll be back.”

Patience rushed out leaving a suspicious Claire and a concerned Jody behind her. Because Patience had seen stained glass behind Kaia in her vision, and she remembered it. It was the same stained glass window as the one in the church Father Hellen lived in.

It couldn’t hurt to check, Patience told herself. Before throwing everyone through about ten different dimensional loops, it couldn’t hurt to check.

*********

Wendy had squeezed her eyes shut to stop the head ache that came with the inherent brightness of the world she had found herself in. She was being transported in some kind of cage, after the fae soldiers had found her in the forest calling for Donna. She’d put up a fight, but ultimately she was no match for the several men and women who had worked to incapacitate her. Now she had been on the road for hours, unable to sleep while the wheels of her prison seemed determined to exaggerate ever small divot in the road. At the very least when it had been night she had had a rest from the blindingly bright colors she was surrounded with.

It was almost midday by the time the procession arrived at what looked to be a city. The homes seemed to grow from the ground itself, large accommodations neatly fitting into the natural landscape. The largest of these dwellings was within a tree that grew out of a large hill. The tree looked to be older than any on Earth, so large that more than one wonder of the world would be able to fit inside it. As the procession approached the grand entrance under the gnarled roots of the tree, Wendy resisted the urge to squint as she took in the enormity of the organism. Complex carvings decorated the arch the roots formed, and continued into the hall that had been cut into the tree. The fact that it was still alive made it all the more impressive.

“Where am I?” Wendy asked again, but she was answered only with mistrustful glares. If the fairies that had captured her spoke English, they apparently didn’t feel like doing so at the moment. Wendy sighed and curled up against the corner of her cage.

She just hoped Donna was okay.

At long last, Wendy was placed in front of a great wooden throne. Sat on top of the throne was the most beautiful woman Wendy had ever seen (possibly excluding Claire, who also had a wowza factor that was quite frankly off the charts). The woman had long light brown hair that was intricately braided and fell past her waist. She wore a bright purple dress with chainmail sewn in on the bodice and down her arms, but she moved as thought the weight were nothing to her. She wasn’t as suspicious as her soldiers, and if anything looked at Wendy kindly.

“You’re a long way from home,” she said. Wendy kept staring at her, her mouth gone a little dry. “My name is Gilda, I’m queen here.”

“Oh,” said Wendy. “That’s… cool, I guess.”

Wendy wondered if now would be the right time to go on a rant about the inherent damaging effects of monarchies, and asking whether the fairies have considered that power should be derived with the consent of the governed. The still hostile looks of the people surrounding her convinced her to keep her mouth shut. When she got home, she could just take Claire to RenFair and complain to her. Much safer.

“It’s my job to decide what happens to you,” said Gilda. “Do you have anything to say for trespassing on our lands?”

Wendy nodded.

“Aunt Donna and I… we’re hunters. We were just trying to close the… the door. Between dimensions. We didn’t want anyone else going missing.”

“Anyone else?” Gilda asked with a slight furrow forming between her eyebrows. It cleared as she thought more. “You mean Arnold? He chose to come with us. We don’t take humans who are unwilling. Anymore, I mean.”

“I’m sitting in a cage.”

“You broke a law,” Gilda said gently. “Arnold heard us singing and came to dance with us. We asked to keep him and he said yes. He only asked to go home when he learned that his sister was going to die soon. He wanted to say goodbye to her before she has a heart attack two days before her eighty-fifth birthday. Then he would come back.”

“He thinks he’s still sixteen,” said Wendy. Possibly sassing a fairy was a bad idea, she realized a moment later. Gilda just sighed.

“Sometimes our methods of travel are… not recommended for humans,” she admitted. “But Arnold was quite insistent. Now, as to your repercussions…”

Gilda looked to a bench of men and women to her right. They whispered among each other before sending a messenger over to her. The messenger whispered in Gilda’s ear and Gilda nodded sagely, but sadly.

“For breaking the laws of the fae, we demand a life,” said Gilda gravely.

*********

Having turned up to Donna’s place only to find it empty, Jody put out Donna’s license and asked to be updated if her car was found. Having nothing else to do in the meantime, she’d reached out to Donna’s police unit and let them know she was sick. In the back of her head, Jody knew how bad it would look for her if they couldn’t find Donna and Jody didn’t report her missing right away, but Jody couldn’t really stand to think that she wouldn’t find Donna.

Claire had gone back to calling Wendy every twenty minutes. She was white-faced and silent, and it was clear to Jody that she had long since given up actually getting an answer. As it approached evening Jody finally snapped and took the phone from her.

“Give it back,” Claire said, lunging after the phone. Jody gave her a look and Claire sat back down. “What if I got her killed too?”

“Claire,” Jody said. “You didn’t get anyone killed. Kaia made her decisions, and you know that. And Wendy was never going to let something like this go. You’re a lot alike that way.”

“Right,” Claire said, staring down at her feet. “Except I could have gone with her. Or told her to pass off the case when they knew they were in over their heads. I could have… I could have done something.”

“And maybe you’d have gone missing too,” said Jody. “You can’t… Claire, yes I want you to be careful and to think before act. But you can’t control everything. You can only make the best decisions you can with the information you have. You couldn’t have known to warn them. You haven’t dealt with fairies before, none of us have.”

Claire still wouldn’t meet her eyes.

“And you couldn’t have warned Kaia, either,” said Jody. “Someday you’re going to need to forgive yourself for that, you know.”

“How do you forgive yourself for something like that?” Claire demanded. And anger Jody could deal with. Claire when she was angry wasn’t as careful. She let things loose, and she behaved recklessly, and it was so much easier to deal with a problem when Jody knew what the problem was.

“A little bit at a time,” said Jody. “And you slip up, and go back to dark places. You stare up at the ceiling late at night and you wonder if you’d just… if you’d just thought about things a little differently, maybe at least my husband be alive, even if it was just him and not-”

Jody stopped talking. The next thing she knew Claire had sat next to her and was leaning her head on her shoulder. Jody pulled her closer, hugging Claire to her side. When Jody had been pregnant, secretly she’d wanted a daughter. She’d never told anybody that, and it hadn’t much seemed to matter when the time came because, Jesus Christ, she had loved her son so much. It seemed an odd thing to feel guilty about now, but of course that was how guilt worked. Didn’t give much of a rat’s ass about rationality.

“We’re going to save them, right?” Claire said quietly. “Wendy and Donna?”

“Yeah,” said Jody. “We’re going to save them.”

**********

Donna had very carefully, and very distantly, followed the party of soldiers out of the woods and through the night. She’d only just found Wendy again when she saw her being captured by the fae. Knowing she would be outnumbered and unable to fight them off, Donna had tossed aside her initial instinct to leap into the action and made sure to think about it all rationally. And rationality said follow Wendy from a distance and get the lay of the land.

The first part had been simple compared to the second.

Space didn’t seem to operate in the same way it did on her world. Donna had spent time wondering how she had so easily lost Wendy in the forest, and the answer was that reality had an element of changeability to it that had to be navigated. She would sometimes find herself walking the opposite direction she needed to be without any memory of having turned or led herself astray. Connecting one moment to another could be difficult sometimes, not because her memory was suffering but because her travel through physical space was a disparate sequence of small moments instead of a smooth continuous experience.

It wasn’t until she reached an area where the forest thickened that the confusion began to clear from her head. Here, the air seemed weighted down more firmly, and reality didn’t move quite so much. It was such a relief that Donna found herself resting just to appreciate the loss of her confusion.

“You’re a tricky one,” she said patting the tree she was resting on. “But I think I’ve been through the worst of it now. And don’t you tell me if I’m not.”

The tree didn’t answer back, which Donna was glad to see. Mindbending rules of reality she could deal with, but talking trees? That would just be too much.

She borrowed a kind of wrap she found from one of the homes she passed by as she surreptitiously attempted to continue following the procession of soldiers. No one seemed to pay her much mind when she looked appropriately dressed, and Donna stopped keeping to the shadows as much. Instead she walked with as much confidence as she could muster. Better to look as though she belonged, she figured.

It was in this way that she made it to the front gates of the palace carved into a tree, and it was in this way that she heard the fate determined for Wendy.

“We demand a life,” said a woman sat upon an intricately carved throne. Before Wendy could so much as give an answer, Donna ran forward. Because Wendy was getting hurt over Donna’s cold, dead body. Perhaps literally.

“No,” said Donna fiercely, standing in front of Wendy’s prison bars. “You don’t get to touch my niece, I don’t care how fancy the chair you sit in is.”

The queen seemed a little rattled by this. She looked at a line of men and women sitting on her right, and then back at Donna and Wendy. It looked as though she weren’t entirely sure what she should be saying to answer Donna. She looked like she wasn’t very sure of anything. In fact, Donna had a bad feeling she wasn’t as in charge as she looked here.

“And who are you?” asked Gilda, more kindly than anything else. Donna frowned at her.

“I’m the woman who’s gonna kick your ass for threatening my niece,” said Donna succinctly. “I’m getting business cards made and everything.”

“Donna, chill it,” Wendy hissed, which Donna elected to ignore.

“You misunderstand,” said Gilda, standing from her throne and stepping down to face the two of them. “We need… life. Either you stay here, or you send someone in your place. Usually, we arrange someone to pick up a first born.”

“You mean kidnap,” said Wendy.

“Your friend will be rewarded for her cleverness avoiding my army,” said Gilda quickly, as though trying to preempt something. “She may leave freely. But Wendy, you must find something to give as payment. Until you do, I’m afraid there is nothing I can do for you.”

Soldiers stepped forward to remove Wendy from the cage. Donna resolutely placed herself in their way. They looked to the Queen and something in Gilda’s jaw seemed to sharpen.

“You’ll both be my guests until you come to a decision,” she said. “Put them in the spare rooms. I’ll come see to them later.”

Donna felt herself marginally relax, and allowed the soldiers to pass her and open the door to let Wendy out. So maybe the fairy queen had more backbone than Donna’s gut had told her. For whatever reason, she seemed to be doing her best for the two of them, and Donna wasn’t going to stare a gift horse in the mouth too long, lest it bite her. Or y’know. Something.

**********

Patience almost felt like she was in a trance as she walked into the church. She felt her hands trace the wall, and brief flashes of her vision sparked as her fingernails trailed along the grain of the carved wood. It drew her forward towards the stairs, and she walked deliberately towards the very room she had been staying in so recently. It was closed and locked, but that didn’t stop Patience.

She knocked, once, twice, three times. A moment before it happened, Patience knew the door was going to open. This was the only thing that saved her.

Patience leapt to the side in order to avoid the sharp thrust of a spear.

“Kaia?” she asked, looking up at someone who seemed simultaneously much more graceful and much more cruel than Kaia had ever looked. The face was the same, but her eyes were wild in a way that made Patience think of a cornered animal.

Patience dodged around a corner as Kaia struck out again. She made a run for one of the upstairs rooms and locked herself inside. The moment the door was closed, she heard a solid thwunk from the other side of the door. Kaia must have thrown the spear at her.

“Why are you doing this?” Patience asked, trying to still her fast beating heart. There was no answer at first, just the soft sound of breathing that let Patience know she wasn’t safe yet. “Kaia, how are you alive?”

“She’s not,” said Kaia through the door. “I’m her and I’m not. I came here because I could. And you’re going to ruin everything.”

“Kaia listen,” said Patience. “Can we just talk? No sharp things.”

“She can’t know.”

It didn’t take a genius for Patience to figure out Kaia was talking about Claire.

“I promise,” Patience shouted through the locked door. Kaia went silent. “Can I come out now?”

“Yes.”

When Patience opened the door, she was half ready to slam it closed again in Kaia’s face. However, instead of finding the girl with spear in hand ready to attack, she found her sitting against the wall, her face in her hands. Patience nearly reached out to touch her before deciding that wasn’t a good idea.

“We need your help,” Patience realized. And then because she could see that Kaia wasn’t going to be swayed by this line of reasoning. “Claire needs your help.”

“Because of the girl who went missing,” said Kaia. “Jody told Father Hellen about it. He said there was nothing we could do.”

“But you know better. You can open doors between worlds,” said Patience. Kaia looked up at her and then turned suddenly towards the stairs. Pounding footsteps approached them, and Patience tensed in preparation to run until she saw who exactly the footsteps belonged to. Father Hellen looked to be in something of a panic when he noticed Patience looking at Kaia.

“No,” he said out loud. “No you don’t understand, she is… She is good. She doesn’t deserve what Claire will do to her if she finds out-“

“So you know,” Patience said, silencing Father Hellen. “You know who she is and you still didn’t tell us.”

“Kaia is unique,” said Father Hellen. “She’s learning. I didn’t want to risk her coming into contact with anyone who would hurt her first and ask questions second.”

“Not even Jody,” Patience said. Father Hellen fell silent again. “Wow. She’s going to love hearing this.”

“You can’t tell her.”

“You said Claire wouldn’t know,” said Kaia, leaping to her feet and stepping towards Patience in a manner that could only be described as threatening. “If she finds out about me, she’ll… she’ll…”

There was something there. Something at the tip of what Kaia wasn’t saying. Unbidden, visions came to Patience, too unreal to occur in waking hours. She saw Kaia lying next to Claire on a blanket in a field, and then a fierce battle between the two. The images flickered back and forth rapidly, and randomly. By trying to reach deeper into the image, Patience felt herself growing dizzy with the dissonance. She nearly threw up before she figured out how to release her hold on Kaia’s projected thoughts. Her inner turmoil.

“How did you do that?” Patience demanded, a little weak in her knees now. Kaia just blinked. “Who are you? Kaia couldn’t do that.”

“I’m Kaia,” said Kaia. Patience’s disbelief was palpable. Kaia hesitated, and then jutted her chin out in preemptory defiance. “And I’m from the Bad Place.”

It was definitely time that Patience called Jody.

**********

Jody barely got her arms around Claire to stop her from launching herself at Father Hellen.

“How fucking dare you?” Claire shouted at him, fighting against Jody’s restraining hold. Not hard enough to hurt Jody, she was still mindful of that, but hard enough that Jody wasn’t sure how long she was going to be able to hold her back. “I knew we couldn’t trust you.”

“Claire,” Patience said. Jody was a little shocked when Claire stopped struggling to look at her. “I’m not going to pretend I know what you’re going through, but get it together. I found you a way to save Wendy. Focus on that.”

“That thing is wearing… it’s wearing Kaia’s face,” said Claire. Jody tightened her hold on Claire again, but this time it was reassuring instead of threatening. Claire feebly pulled at her arms. “She deserves better than that.”

“It’s a little more complicated than that,” said Patience. Jody’s ears perked up.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” she said, but she addressed her question to Father Hellen. He wouldn’t meet her eyes, and for good reason too. Outwardly, she knew there was a time and a place for rage, but inwardly the warmth she’d felt for the man had gone incredibly cold. Because this felt like a betrayal of trust that Jody just hadn’t seen coming, despite Father Hellen’s secretiveness about who exactly he had taken in. “Out with it, Dan.”

Father Hellen nodded to himself.

“It’s… it’s complicated,” he said. “As Patience said. The person you’re looking at is from another world. But it’s a world that’s very different than ours. Claire, I know you’ve been there and seen some of the differences.”

“Yeah, it was washed out green, and the point is?” Claire asked. Jody let go of her, and Claire stayed where she was. Father Hellen took that as a sign of encouragement.

“Light perception was different,” said Father Hellen with a nod. “At least where Kaia lived, there was a lack of large bodies of water. There were the giants and the cloaked lizards, both of which hunt humans and are very different than anything we have here, if what Kaia has told me is correct. And then there are the people.”

“I didn’t see any people there,” said Claire.

“We know how to be quiet. How to hide,” said Kaia. Claire glared at her. “Better than any of you do.”

“And they don’t sleep,” said Father Hellen. Jody started as she realized what that meant. “No souls.”

“Oh,” said Jody, focus sharpening on Kaia again. No soul meant very bad things her book. She’d heard enough from the Winchesters to know that. “How’s that been working out for you?”

“That’s just it,” said Father Hellen. “Kaia has one. A soul, I mean. But she didn’t have one before leaving the Bad Place. When the version of her that came from this world died, she died in a world without a place for souls to go.”

“No heaven above, no hell below,” said Claire, her brow furrowing and the anger off her face for the moment. Jody, too, was trying to put the puzzle together. “So where does a soul with no place to go… go?”

Father Hellen looked at Kaia.

“The closest human body that won’t reject it,” said Father Hellen. “Like I said, she’s unique. She’s two people in one. Kaia Nieves and-“

“The huntress,” Claire said, startling Jody with how faraway she sounded. “You killed her and then you sucked up what was left of her. It was you the whole time. You fucked around in my head, and you were the one who killed her.”

“I was aiming for you,” Kaia said, sounding a little defensive. “She’s the one who stepped into the line of fire. That isn’t my fault.”

“Okay,” said Jody, trying to clear her head and not think about the fact that Claire looked like she was a second away from killing the girl in front of them on principle. “So putting all that aside, how did you get here. Our Kaia, she could open doors, but not without-“

“A power source,” Kaia confirmed. “Giant’s blood. Hunters in my world drink it. It makes us stronger and faster than the things we’re hunting. And it helps with the visions, if you’re gifted like I was.”

“Giants? You mean that huge fucking monstrosity that you called to eat my friends? Those things are as big as skyscrapers,” said Claire.

“They’re hard to kill,” said Kaia. “I’ve only ever killed one, and I nearly died doing that. We have a process for saving as much of the blood as possible. I drank all of the reserves I had on me. It was enough power to open a door to this world. I didn’t know I could do that before she became a part of me.”

And there it was.

“So she can get us to Wendy and Donna?” Jody asked. Patience nodded seriously. “Then let’s do it.”

“I can’t do it without a power source,” said Kaia. “As I’ve been trying to tell Patience for the past hour before you arrived.”

“What kind of power source?” Claire demanded. Kaia looked at her, and Jody frowned as comprehension flashed in Claire’s eyes. “Grace worked before.”

“Is Castiel even close to where we are right now?” Jody asked, assuming she knew where Claire’s thoughts were headed. Claire shook her head. “Jack doesn’t have enough to spare anymore, where are we going to get grace on short notice? Not exactly a ton of angels right now, and even if there were-“

“Doesn’t matter,” said Claire. “Being a vessel, it leaves some residue behind. Cas told me about it. He said it’s why I tend to heal a little faster than normal. I’ve probably got just enough juice for a one way trip.”

“It’ll be enough. I can feel it,” Kaia confirmed. Claire nodded to herself and then turned to Jody.

“Handcuffs?” she asked. Jody handed them over without having to ask what they were for. She knew Claire well enough, and she agreed it was a good idea. Claire turned to look at Kaia. “We do this, you’re not leaving my sight. And when we get back…”

“If we get back. We’ll see who’s better,” said Kaia, her grip on her spear tightening. Jody didn’t like that one bit, but she didn’t stop Claire from placing one cuff around Kaia’s wrist and the other around her own.

“We already know who’s better,” said Claire quietly, her eyes flashing in quiet rage. “Don’t we, huntress?”

Monster, Jody thought to herself. It was the word Claire was thinking, and it made killing Kaia fair game. In Claire’s mind at least.

**********

“Close your eyes,” said Kaia. Claire hesitated a moment, very aware of the fact that Kaia’s spear (the one she’d used to kill the real Kaia) was now on the ground within arm’s reach. She’d probably feel the tug if Kaia decided to reach for it, but that didn’t settle her nerves. “It’ll work better. Think about Wendy, and I’ll see if I can find her.”

“You fuck around in her head too?” asked Claire, but she closed her eyes as she said it.

“Only once. I don’t know her well enough to find her dreams again without help,” said Kaia, and with Claire’s eyes closed she sounded different. More human. “She seems like a good person.”

And fuck, Claire was not supposed to be feeling this rush of guilt. Because Kaia was still dead, if her soul was shoved into somebody else’s body or not, and Wendy was waiting for her and-

Kaia placed both of her hands on either side of Claire’s face. The tingling sensation of electricity moved under Claire’s skin, and an echo of a dream came back to her as she opened her eyes to see Kaia’s face shining with veined lines of silver.

‘Whatever you have to do, Claire,’ said Kaia Nieves, the soft Kaia, the real Kaia. The one Claire had kissed in her dream. ‘I forgive you.’

The vision was shattered when the Huntress screamed, light pulsing out of her and searing through Claire. The world went black.

**********

Patience getting sucked into fairy land had not been part of the plan. In fact, she had very purposefully not been standing close to Claire and Kaia when they’d been trying to open the door because she’d assumed it would operate like a door. As in you actually had to walk through it, and it would stay open for a little while. But as Patience turned around, she saw the crack in the world close almost instantly behind them. Kaia hadn’t been kidding about this being a one way solution.

Patience turned back around panicked, and only relaxed when she saw Jody was there, too. And just a little behind Jody, an unconscious Claire and Kaia were curled up on the ground side by side, still handcuffed together.

Claire was the first person to stir.

“What the hell?” she said, frowning at Patience, and then at Kaia. She tried to leap to her feet, but was hindered by the handcuffs. She had her long angel sword drawn from the harness at her back within seconds. “Who the hell are you?”

“What are you talking about?” asked Patience, just as Jody was waking. If anything, she looked more confused than Claire did.

“Jody,” said Claire in relief. “Do you know how we got here?”

“Uh, hello to you too,” said Jody with a deep frown. “Where the hell am I?”

Something cold settled in Patience’s stomach. She remembered now that Claire had mentioned that the victim Wendy and Donna had been investigating couldn’t remember his life past the age of 16.

“Why do you have a sword?” yelped Kaia, waking up and trying to leap away from Claire, only to be yanked back by her wrist as Claire tried to do the same.

“Why do you have a spear?” Claire yelled back at her. “And why are you hand cuffed to-“

Patience put her fingers in her mouth and whistled. Slowly, everyone turned to face her.

“We so do not have time for this,” she said. “Jody, last thing you remember?”

“Putting my son to sleep,” said Jody. “I read him a bed time story- I’m sorry, do I know any of you? Because I’m starting to get a little concerned I’ve been kidnapped by teenage girls.”

“I’m twenty one,” said Claire sullenly. Then what Jody said seemed to hit her. “Aw shit, Jody-“

“Nope,” said Patience, interrupting. She was not going to watch Jody receive the news that her son and husband were long dead. It was too much to think about it. Claire seemed to agree, because for once she shut up. “Claire last thing you remember?”

“Not your bossy ass,” said Claire. Patience stared her down. “I don’t know okay? I guess checking into a motel. Texting Dean something mean about his taste in movies. Not that you’d know who that is.”

“Oh, I know more than you do right now,” said Patience, feeling a little hysterical now. “You?”

Kaia had almost unconsciously hidden herself behind Claire from Patience’s focused attention. And Claire had not only let her, but positioned herself in a defensive position. It was quite a feat considering that they were still handcuffed together and had only just met each other technically.

“I took too many pills trying to stay awake,” said Kaia quietly. “Ended up in a psych ward. Was I- Was I unconscious just now?”

Claire nods, and Kaia seems lost in a reverie.

“I didn’t go to the Bad Place,” she said to herself, sheer relief in her voice. “There was just nothing. No dreams. No monsters.”

“Okay then, Nancy Thompson,” said Claire, frowning at Kaia thoughtfully. “You, uh, having a monster problem?”

“Something like that,” said Kaia, and to Patience’s surprise Claire’s face softened into something gentle and protective. It seemed to surprise Kaia too, because she couldn’t take her eyes off Claire. Patience wondered what the chances were of that kind of immediate connection twice.

“Guys, I know this is… confusing,” said Patience, trying to interrupt whatever moment Claire and Kaia was having without spooking Jody. “But… okay simplest version of this. We all know each other, but some kind of magic messed up your memories. Since I’m the only one who remembers everything you’re going to have to listen to me, and in the meantime we have two people to save, so let’s get going.”

“Now wait a second,” said Jody. “I’m not doing anything until you explain to me where exactly I am and how I got here.”

“We’re in a fairy dimension. We got here by magic,” said Patience. Jody scoffed. “Okay, fine. Don’t believe me, but at least believe this. Two women are in danger, and there is a… a future version of you who really cares about both of them. Please, Jody, you have to care about that.”

Jody didn’t say anything for a few moments.

“Look, I don’t know what’s going on,” she said. “But if someone’s in danger, I’ll help. As long as when this is over, I get to go home.”

Patience breathed a sigh of relief.

“So,” said Claire, who seemed to accept the situation much easier than Jody did, if only because she remembered enough to know she knew who Jody was and that Jody didn’t remember her. “Who are we saving?”

*********

Gilda’s rooms were staffed only with a man who was decorated with golden tattoos. He introduces himself as Gerry, and grumpily sets up a bed for both Wendy and Donna, all the while passive aggressively making rude comments about Queen Gilda.

“Gilda probably won’t kill you,” he said. “A life of servitude is more likely. She’s generous that way. Very generous, for a monster. You know she kidnapped me? Oh, but first she seduced my girlfriend and turned her against me. As if my queen would have ever willingly chosen to sleep with a woman-“

Wendy decided quickly she didn’t like Gerry. At all. The more he rambled, the more his barbs against Gilda seemed to be laced with homophobia and anger. Donna managed to force a smile and chatter on with him for a while, and when it came out that he was being punished for having summoned Gilda to the human world. There was more to that story, Wendy was sure of it, but she didn’t feel like digging to get the full story out of Gerry. He seemed to have decided pretty firmly he was a victim, and she had no doubt he wasn’t going to reveal anything that contradicted that narrative too strongly.

It was a relief when Gilda arrived and dismissed him. Gerry sullenly stalked off, glaring balefully back at Gilda as he left. She ignored him, almost artfully. Like she was trying to add insult to injury.

“Well, he sure acted like the world was the bad end of a bumble bee,” Donna said conversationally. Wendy snorted.

“Yeah, what did you ever do to him?” she asked Gilda. “Besides stealing his girlfriend.”

“I saved his life,” she said, cryptically. Then she sighed. “He enslaved me in his world, and used me to kill his enemies. The tribunal I took him to demanded his blood, and I told him I would accept his servitude instead. He took my mercy poorly.”

“And the girlfriend?” Donna asked. Gilda smiled a little wistfully.

“She was never his in anything but his imagination,” she said with a little bit of mirth that confirmed to Wendy that Gerry had been spouting possessive homophobic nonsense. “She wasn’t really mine either. Not for long. There was a dimension between us. It never would have worked. I still… I still think of her sometimes. My fiery haired beauty, the false queen of Moondoor. My Charlie. It’s why my advisors accuse me of being too soft on humans.”

“Too soft?” Wendy asked.

“Well, we sometimes used to let you stumble after fairy lights until you died of exhaustion. And that was what we did for entertainment,” said Gilda. “I think I’ve made some improvements.”

“But you can’t help us anymore than you already are,” Wendy guessed, turning to look at Donna grimly.

“I’m afraid not,” said Gilda. “I can take the promise of your first born, a promise that you will stay here until eternity as one of my people, or… or your death.”

“Having kids isn’t exactly on my to do list,” Wendy gulped. Donna reached to pat her shoulder. “How long do I have to decide?”

“Until tomorrow,” said Gilda. Jesus. Wendy wanted to puke. There had to be some other way out of this or… or something.

“We just wanted to figure out what was going on,” said Wendy. “We didn’t mean to break any laws. Can’t you just give us a break?”

Gilda didn’t have to answer for Wendy to realize the answer to that was no. The queen left soon after that. Wendy turned to look Donna.

“What am I supposed to do?”

*********

Patience had decided on telling Claire that Wendy was her girlfriend. This was in part to protect her from getting reattached to Kaia, which had been an immediate problem. For whatever reason, the Huntress seemed to have been suppressed completely from Kaia’s memories, and that meant they were essentially traveling around with the same Kaia who had sacrificed herself for Claire within twenty four hours of meeting her. And the shy glances between the two had not been encouraging to Patience’s hope that Claire could look after herself as far as Kaia was concerned.

Unfortunately, hearing that she had a girlfriend had backfired on Patience, because that was now all Claire wanted to talk about. And all while she kept eyes up at Kaia, who still looked at Claire like she was the reason the sun rose and set.

“What’s she like?” Claire asked Patience for the umpteenth time. “Wendy?”

“She’s… I don’t know,” said Patience with a deep sigh. “I guess she’s pretty? And you’re teaching her how to be a hunter. She’s gotten pretty good at fighting. She built you a bed.”

“She built me a bed?” said Claire. “Wow, that’s even gayer than I expected. Cool.”

“Well not from scratch,” said Patience. “From Ikea. You bought her donuts as payment.”

“Huh, smooth move. Good for me,” said Claire. Patience rolled her eyes in annoyance. “Sorry I keep asking questions, I’ve just never had a girlfriend before. It’s exciting. I only just really figured out that I like girls better than boys. Mostly.”

Patience frowned.

“You’re bisexual?”

“I mean technically,” said Claire with a shrug. “But it’s like 80-20 in favor of girls, so I swing between saying that and just calling myself a lesbian. Like I could date a guy, but I don’t think I will. Haven’t I told you this before, if we’re such good friends? I phoned Alex about it for like an hour when I was figuring this shit out.”

“Uh, no,” said Patience. “I think I asked once, and you said, and I quote ‘I’m gay, Patience, it’s not that complicated.’”

“Yikes,” said Claire. “Either I really don’t trust you, or I really don’t like you. Maybe both.”

“Or you’re just a bit of a dick,” said Patience, which made Claire snort.

“That is… not inaccurate,” she admitted.

”In your defense, you’ve been having a rough time recently.”

Claire grimaced.

“As bad a rough time as Jody?” she asked. Patience’s failure to answer was answer enough. “I want to ask who exactly it is that died but… fuck I don’t want to know yet. I’ve got a feeling I’ll know soon enough.”

“Probably a good choice,” said Patience. She tried to smile at Claire, only to see that Claire had stopped walking and was staring at something. Patience turned to look and saw the air around Claire and Kaia glimmering, shining sparks glowing around them. Claire’s eyes seemed to light up almost silver when she reached out to touch them. “Claire?”

“What the hell?” Jody asked in alarm. The column of sparks moved dragging Claire and Kaia in its wake. They stumbled after it, laughing with each other and speaking as though neither had a care in the world. It was such a disconcerting about face in personality for the both of them, Patience almost pinched herself to check if she was dreaming. “Do we follow them?”

“I think we’d better,” said Patience anxiously. Now would be a really good time to have a vision, and it was only now that Patience realized she hadn’t had a single one since being sucked into the fairy dimension. “In fact the faster we do that the better.”

Jody and Patience ran after the two women. Jody stopped after a moment staring down at her legs in confusion, as if they weren’t obeying her correctly.

“Stiffer than I’m used to,” she said, quietly. And yeah a decade would do that to you, Patience thought, but she didn’t say anything. She didn’t know how to give the monsters are real talk, and Jody didn’t sound ready to believe quite yet. “C’mon.”

Patience nodded and continued running after Claire and Kaia.

**********

Kaia didn’t remember a moment in which she’d ever felt so light. The air around her shimmered with glittering lights, and every time she reached out and touched one, she felt a thrill of happiness. Her insides felt glowing warm, and for the first time in eternity she felt well rested. It took only a glance at Claire to see she felt the same way, and Kaia slipped her hand into Claire’s without thought, even if the handcuffs linking them together made it a tad uncomfortable.

Claire laughed with her. They didn’t know where they were going, but that didn’t seem to matter. For once, Kaia wasn’t afraid, not of anything. It was so freeing she could almost feel anxiety at the edge of her euphoria that this would end and she would have to go back to being miserable, shoving poison in her body just to stay awake.

“Claire,” she said breathlessly. “Claire, we can’t stop running.”

Something seemed to flicker in the effortlessly happy expression on Claire’s face.

“Not ever,” Kaia stressed to her, her hand tightening around Claire’s. The lights around them start swirling faster, and their feet move more quickly beneath them. “If we stop-“

“We won’t,” said Claire. “But, but we have to find Wendy.”

Kaia had forgotten about Wendy. She was pretty sure until this moment Claire had, too. Of course, Claire didn’t really know Wendy. She couldn’t remember her, just like she couldn’t remember Kaia and Kaia couldn’t remember Claire. In fact, if Kaia weren’t attached to Claire by the wrist, she wouldn’t mind if Claire stopped. If she left. Just as long as Kaia didn’t stop feeling like this.

“Kaia, I think something’s wrong,” said Claire. Kaia wasn’t sure how much time had passed, but when she turned to look at Claire, her skin had gone paler and the shine in her eyes was fading.

“We have to keep running.”

“No, Kaia,” said Claire. “We don’t. We really don’t.”

They were starting to fall behind the lights, and Kaia could feel the warmth fading from her, and the happiness with it. She could run faster, she knew she could, but Claire was holding her back.

Claire was the one who tripped, wheezing now and weakly begging Kaia to stop running. Her fall dragged Kaia down with her, and Kaia saw the lights stop just out of her reach. She needed to touch them again. She couldn’t lose the feeling-

“Kaia, please,” said Claire. “You’ll kill yourself. You’ll kill us both. You don’t have to run anymore.”

“You don’t get it. I do. If I don’t they’ll get me,” said Kaia. She’d left the spear abandoned by the field they’d landed in, but now she wished she had it. She was so afraid. Without the lights to keep her happy, the terror of her life hit her full force and she was drowning in it. As long as she could remember she’d been terrorized and scarred by monsters, and now she had the chance to make it stop. She tried to lunge after the column of lights, but Claire seemed to summon her remaining strength and launched herself over Kaia, quickly pinning her to the ground. The lights kept moving now, slowly getting farther away, but not far enough that Kaia couldn’t still reach them if she could just get Claire off of her. “Let me go!”

“Nothing’s going to get you. I promise, I’ll protect you,” said Claire, desperately, and Kaia had the strangest sense she’d heard these words before. “Please Kaia, I don’t want to die.”

The lights moved another inch away. Kaia longed to reach for them, and strangely she knew she could. She was stronger than Claire, she could feel it. Something about Claire’s expression told her that Claire knew it too.

“Okay,” Kaia said quietly. “I trust you.”

Claire collapsed, her grasp on Kaia’s arms slipping and her head falling to the ground by Kaia’s shoulder. Kaia reached out to touch her face, and Claire’s eyes blinked open sluggishly.

“Hey thanks for not killing both of us,” Claire said, still breathing hard from running after the lights. Kaia found herself laughing, almost hysterical.

“All in a day’s work. I like to think living another day is the best way to spite the racists in Trump’s America,” said Kaia. Claire laughed, and her breath tickled against the side of Kaia’s neck. Claire’s eyes were wide and wild and and the kind of blue that always looks a little sad no matter the lighting, and Kaia couldn’t look away. “You’re really pretty, did you know that?”

“Not so bad yourself,” Claire said, almost like it was on automatic. And then she blushed a little and looked away. “I mean. Uh, thanks. And you too. A lot. But girlfriend. I have one, I think. I mean I don’t remember, but-“

Claire and Kaia were saved from the awkward by an out of breath Patience and Jody catching up to them. They stopped running when they noticed Claire practically laying on top of Kaia on the ground. Jody raised a skeptical eyebrow while Patience actually threw her hands up in the air.

“Jesus, Claire, really?” she said. Claire quickly detangled herself from Kaia, blushing even harder. But at the same time she kept her nose up as Patience stared down at her. “Can you stop being Fabio for like five minutes?”

“Oh shut up, you wish I would I hit on you,” said Claire. “And I wasn’t even… we would have been dead in five minutes if I hadn’t tackled her out of those damn lights. We weren’t having fun times on the forest floor.”

“It was a little fun,” said Kaia. Claire elbowed her, but she could feel the corner of her mouth twitching into a small smile. “I noticed you have a cute scar on your forehead. That was cool. The almost dying part, we definitely shouldn’t do that again though.”

“Okay, I didn’t want to have to say this,” said Patience, interrupting the spinning wheels of ‘oh god a cute girl noticed me what do I do’ that were going around in Claire’s head. “But Kaia is literally dead. The only reason you can talk to her right now is because the thing whose body that is clearly got suppressed by whatever magic erased your memories. As soon as you get them back, she goes back to being a homicidal wreck who thinks it’s your destiny to kill her.”

“Wait, what?” said Claire.

“I’m dead?” said Kaia. “I feel like current evidence suggests otherwise.”

“You died in the Bad Place. For Claire,” Patience explained. Kaia paled at the mention of the Bad Place. “You’re just… memories of who Kaia was. That body isn’t even yours. When the huntress wakes up, you’ll be gone again and I don’t want to watch Claire go through that twice, so stop trying to get close to her. It doesn’t work out for either of you.”

“Hey, leave her alone Amazon drama queen,” said Claire, stepping forward and dragging a shell shocked looking Kaia in her wake. “First of all, what I do is none of your fucking business, and second of all, I don’t see you in any hurry to tell Jody what the fuck is waiting for her on the other side of all of this.”

“Excuse me?” said Jody. Claire looked at her and then away.

“Jody, don’t… don’t ask,” said Patience. And Patience wasn’t going to tell her, but Claire would. Jody seemed to realize that, and it only took a brief nod in Claire’s direction to start the words.

“You lose them,” said Claire. “Your kid and his dad. And then you take us in. That’s how I know you. You’ve got your own little home for wayward girls. And you fight monsters and you survived the Apocalypse. More than once. You went on a date with the King of Hell and lived to tell the tale. You’re… you’re actually pretty badass and the closest thing I’ve had to a mom since… a long time.”

Jody just stared at her. She didn’t believe it, or she couldn’t, it didn’t matter. It felt like rejection.

“So great, does everyone feel better now?” said Claire, directing her ire at Patience. “Y’know, maybe this place took that shit away for a reason. Maybe… maybe we shouldn’t push it.”

“It won’t change things just because you don’t remember it, Claire,” said Patience. She sounded tired.

“It could for her,” said Claire, her head tilting towards Kaia. “If whatever else she is doesn’t get back in charge… she’s just her. She deserves that. Besides, I said I’d look out for her. So fuck you.”

Claire was about to storm off with Kaia when she turned around and noticed that five people were watching them argue. They were very beautiful people, and the colors the wore almost seemed too bright. Like they’d been saturated past the point the human eye was capable of handling.

“Uh, hi,” Claire said intelligently. It was all she managed before they were swiftly captured, and well, if that didn’t just sum her day up.

**********

It should have surprised Wendy that Claire, Patience, and Jody had also been dragged in front of the court the next day. It should have, but it didn’t. They all looked more confused than anything else, and Jody responded to Donna’s shout of delight with a look of bemused confusion. Claire didn’t even seem to notice Wendy until Patience whispered something in her ear. Then she waved shyly at Wendy, something the girl next to her didn’t seem to like very much. Wendy had never met this girl before, but the way she crowded next to Claire was itching at the jealous part of herself that she pretended didn’t exist. Not that she and Claire were anything, but still, it kind of stung that Claire had found some other girl to fawn over her.

Or at least it did until Gilda let out a sigh of frustration and let them all talk to each other. That was when Wendy found out the small dark haired girl beside Claire was Kaia. The dead girl, not so dead after all.

Patience also explained to Donna and Wendy that Claire, Kaia, and Jody had all suffered to different extents from memory loss. Claire recognized Donna, but not Wendy for that reason. Once this information was relayed to Gilda (who was busy openly arguing with her advisors), she said she would restore their memories. Wendy watched as Claire and Kaia exchanged a glance and tried to deny Gilda’s offer, but before they could say a word, she had gently grasped each of their wrists and then moved onto Jody.

The change in all of them was instantaneous. Claire’s shoulders slumped slightly and her frown lines deepened. Jody, too, looked like an enormous weight had just been placed on her. It was one she looked used to, but there was a lot of sadness in her eyes at realizing that the weight had returned. And Kaia was the most dramatic change of all. Her eyes grew colder, and her posture became lithe and tense. She body language still seemed oddly in sync to Claire’s, but instead of revolving around it, it seemed oppositional. Like she was waiting for a fight to break out.

Wendy listened as Claire dully relayed her story to Gilda, and Gilda became furious about the fairy lights that had almost killed Claire and Kaia. They had been banned in her lands for years, and Claire and the others were immediately offered a royal pardon and apology for their inconvenience. Which meant Wendy was still the only one on trial for trespassing, and thank goodness for that. Well, not thank goodness, but it could have been worse.

“Have you come to your decision?” Gilda asked, once the advisors had calmed down and confirmed her decision not to prosecute Claire, Jody, Patience, and Kaia’s intrusion into their dimension.

“I… Isn’t there anything you want besides a life?” Wendy asked. “I can write a really good essay about queer women in rural America instead.”

“How about mine,” said Claire, because of course it would be Claire.

“On second thought, I think I’ll go with a first born. It’s cool that I don’t plan on ever getting pregnant, right?” said Wendy, hoping Claire would shut the fuck up.

“I’m supposed to kill someone,” said Claire, her eyes flicking sideways the the girl she was chained to and what the fuck, Wendy had missed this side plot. “Call it destiny, or whatever the fuck. And I don’t want that. I promised I’d avenge someone I got killed, and that’s all wrapped up in this too. So how about I hand in a destiny and a promise. If I say screw both of those, that’s a pretty different life I’m living. What do you say, that life I’m not going to live for the one you’re not going to take from Wendy.”

Gilda considered this thoughtfully. Wendy resisted the urge to have this shit explained to her, because as far as she knew the only promise Claire had ever made that she gave a shit about was her promise to tear Kaia’s killer a new one, and Kaia looked fine to her.

“Potential can be… powerful. Especially if there is a certain amount of momentum behind it,” she admitted. “But you have to know that you can never fulfill this destiny or this promise. If you do, Wendy will be brought back here for the rest of time. Whether she is dead or alive, it doesn’t matter, her soul will be brought back here.”

Well… that didn’t actually sound so bad. And Claire not being so hell bent on her revenge mission didn’t sound like a terrible thing.

“Deal,” said Claire.

“As long as you promise to send Arnold back to us,” said Gilda, looking to her advisors for approval. They muttered amongst themselves and then their messenger nodded.

“I can do that,” promised Wendy. “Now, can you send us home?”

The next moment, Wendy was sitting next to Donna on the new living room couch in Donna’s apartment. So that was quick. Now all Wendy had to do was go back to Arnold and make sure he’d said goodbye to his sister, and then get him back to fairy land.

He went easier than Wendy thought he would, considering he couldn’t actually remember fairy land.

“I never really fit here,” he told her, as Wendy repeated the spell that had caused all of this trouble in the first place. He didn’t explain it better than that, but by the time Wendy thought to ask for more details, he was already gone. Back to Gilda, Wendy supposed. She’d learned from one of the guards that Gilda had a habit of adopting humans ever since she’d fallen in love with one. It seemed kind of sad, now that Wendy had some distance from it. Wendy wondered if Gilda was waiting for that human woman she’d loved to just wander into fairy land and find her. If she was wistfully spending her days hoping for a happy ending that was never going to come to her, and just muddling through the rest in the meantime.

Wendy wondered if that was what she was doing with Claire.

**********

Claire, Jody, Patience, and Kaia all landed where they had been before Kaia had transported them to the fairy dimension. It was disorienting to have changed locations so instantaneously that there was not even a fraction of a second of transition. It made Jody feel nauseous, but she successfully swallowed the urge to puke.

“Everyone accounted for?” she asked, looking relieved when she saw both Patience and Claire nod back at her. And Kaia too, damn it, even if she was a bit strange now. “Good. Mission accomplished, and now I need to take a nap. Like a two day nap.”

“Uh, Jody,” said Claire quickly, holding up the hand that was still attached to Kaia. Jody tossed her the keys, and Claire unlocked the handcuffs and then tossed both back. Jody caught them and pretended to be busy putting them away while she eavesdropped in on Claire and Kaia’s conversation. “No more shit, okay? I’m not going to kill you. I’m not going to bug you. And you’re not going to bug anyone else. You wanted a second chance in a new universe? You got it. Don’t fuck it up.”

“So what,” said Kaia, rubbing at the wrist that had just been freed. “I just mean nothing to you?”

Claire swallowed hard and then nodded. Jody could see how much it took out of her to do it.

“Yeah, pretty much,” she said. And that seemed to hollow something out of Kaia too. She didn’t say anything, but her eyes unfocused and for a moment she looked young and lost. A lot more like Kaia Nieves than the huntress. Jody almost wanted to pull her into a hug. Over the course of a day, this girl had lost the one thing she seemed to have kept from her old world (her spear), whatever was binding her to Claire, and he control over her body. If Jody didn’t know she was a stone cold killer, she might actually make some attempt to comfort the poor girl.

“So be it,” said Kaia to Claire. “Just remember that you can’t kill me if you want your Wendy to have her freedom. Gilda never said anything about the opposite.”

And with that, Kaia turned and disappeared back into the gloomy church. Jody supposed Dan was probably waiting inside, avoiding her. Avoiding consequences. It seemed to be what he was best with, distancing himself from consequences.

It only took the sound of Kaia’s scream to know that Father Hellen’s time was up. Despite how angry she was with him, Jody still ran into the church, praying without really thinking, praying for the first time in years, that Daniel was okay. She was sick and tired of burying the people she cared about, and it was with a kind of halting horror that she stopped next to Kaia to see Father Hellen staring at them both. Only, he wasn’t quite Father Hellen anymore.

Dear God, what could have possessed him to give in and feed?

“He made me,” Father Hellen babbled, looking away from Kaia and Jody shamefully. He was changing slowly, infinitesimally, and Jody knew even now he was fighting it with everything he had. “He came to me, an archangel heaven sent, and he made me. He fed me his own divine flesh. Oh God. Kaia… Jody… I’m so sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Jody said, and she could feel herself babbling. Despite her best judgment she was at his side, even as his skin broke and changed color, beginning to ooze. Even as his humanity started to disappear before her eyes. “Dan, it’s okay, I’m here. You’ve just… you’ve gotta hold on.”

“He asked me what I wanted,” Father Hellen said, practically sobbed. “And I told him… All I wanted, all I ever wanted was to be good.”

“You are good,” said Jody. “I’m not saying I’m not still pissed about you keeping secrets, but you’re a good guy. You have to keep fighting this. You’re not a monster.”

“I am, I am. God doesn’t want men, he only wants monsters,” Father Hellen cried. “The angel told me so. He told me if I was truly good, I wouldn’t want… I wouldn’t want so much. Jody the things I’ve longed for-“

“Dan, listen to me. Whoever talked to you, whatever they said, it doesn’t matter,” said Jody. “Stay with me, okay? There has to be some way we can fix this, or stop this. We can still save you.”

“I’ve been so hungry, for so long,” said Father Hellen, and his eyes were ravenous. “And he told me what I really wanted was to eat.”

“No,” said Kaia, kneeling next to Jody. “No, that’s not true. I don’t care who spoke to you. Gods and angels, what do they know? I’m the one who’s seen your dreams. I know what you want. You want Jody to keep smiling at you when she thinks you’re not looking. You want me to stay here with you, so you can take care of me. You want to prove you’re more than just a hungry mouth, and here’s your chance to prove it. You didn’t eat. You were fed. That has to matter, somehow. This is magic we’re talking about, intent matters!”

“I wanted-“

“He forced you,” Jody said, clinging onto hope even as she knew that maybe it didn’t matter. That this version of Kaia didn’t even know the rules of their universe, just her own, and the rules of this universe had a bad habit of changing anyway. “You didn’t want to eat. Not really. Fight it, Dan. You can do this.”

All their encouragement didn’t reverse the transformation, but sometimes it seemed to stop it in intervals. It was at one such lucid stoppage that Jody watched as Father Hellen blearily peered over her shoulder. Jody turned and saw Claire standing behind them, a homemade flame thrower ready in her hands and something like regret already written on her face.

“I sent Patience to make sure Wendy and Donna got home, and so she’d be safe. Then I figured… I’ll only do it if he turns, Jody,” she said to Jody, who nodded her thanks. It wasn’t lost on her that Claire had said if, and not when. Father Hellen shuddered on the floor, still fighting his transformation. Still fighting what history and every hunter Jody had ever met said was inevitable. Rugarus always turned. Claire too looked at Father Hellen, but for the first time Jody saw something like compassion in her expression. “If I have to, I’ll make it as quick as I can.”

“Thank you. Don’t let me hurt anyone,” panted Father Hellen, his skin now all covered in sweat. Jody clutched him closer to her side, even as more muscles began to bulge under his skin, threatening to burst him open again. Jody almost felt like she was squeezing him to keep his transformation in. To keep him from changing.

“Don’t give up,” she said to him. “Please don’t give up.”

And so Jody watched helpless as a man she cared deeply for fought against his very own nature, and even as she begged him to fight, she knew that the likeliest outcome was that she and Kaia would be thrown like ragdolls when the transformation was complete, and then Claire would burn Father Hellen to a crisp.

Still, for now there was hope, and that was exactly what Jody was holding onto.

**Author's Note:**

> A wild Michael appears
> 
> I know that tying this series into canon is going to bite me in the butt, but whatever. Until the Wayward characters come back, it's still canon compliant technically.
> 
> Let me know if you like the series. I'm thinking of writing two more "episodes" of these, and then calling it wrapped up.


End file.
